Tourist dodging in NYC

Very excited about Austin. Today, I’ve been transferring some of my recorded New York City Marathon coverage to DVD, so am getting in the spirit again.

I was out this morning to run some errands, and it was very cold and windy. When I saw on the WeatherBug that the temp was 28 degrees with 16 MPH winds, I chickened out of my 10.3 mile run, and decided to do my lower loop 6.5 mile course instead. In the end, it did not turn out as cold as I thought and I wish I did the full 10.3 miles. It was not very windy, the sun was out, and with 3 shirts, I felt a little overdressed. Next time I’ll stick with the original plan…

I had all kinds of little issues this morning. First, forgot to bring my watch. I tried to note the start and stop times on my MP3 player, but I have a bad memory and can’t remember the exact times, of course. I also had some problems with my clothes. This is my 4th run since the last time laundry was done, so I’m at the bottom of the barrel. With the cold weather, I used my last 3 long sleeve shirts, and my triathlon shorts under the last pair of tights in my pile. My 2 light pairs of gloves were both unavailable as I threw them in the wash after getting them soaked through on Thursday night. So, I had to use an alternate pair of very heavy gloves, probably too heavy. I also had problems with my tights. In the early part of my run, they kept falling down! I guess with the slippery tri shorts underneath, they kept slipping. I had to stop to pull them up and then tie the drawstring. Of course the drawstring had partially disappeared into the waistline, so it was a project to get it out and get it tied, etc.

Otherwise, the run was fine. There were many, many tourists out and about today, at Ground Zero on Church St, at Battery Park, The Helliport below West St, and at South Street Seaport. I’m used to the ‘people dodge’ during the summer time, but wasn’t prepared for it in the middle of December.

When on my run in the rain on Thursday night, I could swear that I saw a bike lane painted at some point on Ave A. That would be a great addition to the avenue. On my run today, though, I was disappointed to see that the bike lane is only on 1 block, from 9th St to 10th St. I see the need for it on that block, to connect the westbound riders on 10th St (around Tompkins Square Park) to the bike lane on 9th St., but I really hope they extend it all the way down Ave A at some point.